


ain't here to break ya (just see to far it'll bend)

by havisham



Category: Original Work
Genre: Adrenaline, Banter, Enemies to Lovers, Getting Together, Identity Porn, M/M, Opposites Attract, Superheroes, Supervillains
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-20
Updated: 2019-10-20
Packaged: 2020-12-16 11:38:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21035636
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/havisham/pseuds/havisham
Summary: The Blaze was squeaky clean, as far as Skip could find. Perfect. Untouchable. And the whole thing made Skip sick. Everyone had a flaw, even bright shining superheroes like the Blaze. And it was up to -- or down to -- a villain like Skip to show everyone how flawed and fucked up their golden boy really was.Now, Skip considered himself a modern part of the hero/villain community. Having a nemesis was kind of passé, especially someone you hadn’t actually met yet. But if he met the Blaze today, he was sure he would tell him that all this effort he’d put into unmasking his dark side wasn’t personal --oh no, not personal at all-- but merely professional curiosity. Maybe even for the public good.Yeah. Maybe even that.





	ain't here to break ya (just see to far it'll bend)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sandrine Shaw (Sandrine)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sandrine/gifts).

There was something familiar with the way the new guy moved that Skip couldn’t get out of his head, even after he’d reviewed the files a dozen times already. Hector had ridiculed his obsessiveness and Skip had thrown a cushion at him, but it was true. Something about the Blaze struck a chord in Skip, but he couldn’t put a finger on _what_. Not that it mattered, exactly. Core City didn’t need another dumbass hero who though they could “make a difference” and “change lives” when they didn’t know anything about where they were and didn’t care to learn. They just wanted to get views, get likes and get sponsors. 

And that was fine by Skip. After all, it was a part of his job to catch these guys when they fucked up. Sure, Skip did the whole villain thing -- crimes, chaos, whatever. But he was a villain of the 21st century. And that meant posting vids of heroes fucking up as consistently as he could. And that got him so much more success than robbery or capers ever could. If he was truly successful, he could take everything from them, the likes, the sponsors, everything. If that made Skip a villain, so be it. He didn’t even need a dumb fake name for his work, although yeah, Skip wasn’t exactly on his driver’s license. Whatever. 

The thing was that Skip had a mission. He was determined to bring the Blaze down. He’d been on that mission for months now and it hadn’t happened. The Blaze was_ good_. He actually went around rescuing people from burning buildings. He rescued kittens from trees. He didn’t have any secret racist Facebook pages, at least none that Skip could find and Skip was very,_ very_ good at finding those (and had brought down The Senator, a popular and well-regarded hero years ago with exactly that reason. Also, there was that whole money-laundering thing and the secret moon-colony. The Senator had been a very troubled man.) 

But the Blaze? Squeaky clean, as far as Skip could find. Perfect. Untouchable. And the whole thing made Skip sick. Everyone had a flaw, even bright shining superheroes like the Blaze. And it was up to -- or down to -- a villain like Skip to show everyone how flawed and fucked up their golden boy really was.

Now, Skip considered himself a modern part of the hero/villain community. Having a nemesis was kind of passé, especially someone you hadn’t actually met yet. But if he met the Blaze today, he was sure he would tell him that all this effort he’d put into unmasking his dark side wasn’t personal -- _oh no, not personal at all_ \-- but merely professional curiosity. _Maybe_ even for the public good. The moon-colony thing was fucked up, right? 

With those dark thoughts in mind, Skip wrote down a few more possibilities of who the Blaze could be. 

“Hey,” Hector said, interrupting Skip’s intense note-taking. “Do you want to go down to the Loose Goose or not? It’s Friday, I’m tired.” 

“Is Lindsay busy?” 

“We broke up, man. I told you.” 

“Oh. I wasn’t listening.” 

“You’re like the worst sidekick ever.” 

“Fuck off,” Skip said, annoyed. “I’m definitely not the sidekick here.” 

*

The Loose Goose was the bar where both sides of the hero and villain communities could mingle. Located in a quiet suburban strip mall, next to the vape shop and a nail art place, no one would know that it was anything but a hole in the wall. 

Masks were forbidden, as were weapons. Everyone went in and pretended to be perfectly normal strangers. Skip didn’t usually go there with Hector or Lindsay, but tonight, he decided to take a chance. Maybe he could forget the Blaze for one hot second. 

There was a guy. Skip clocked him almost immediately on coming in. Well, the Loose Goose was filled with guys -- and girls, but there was something about this guy. He was cute. _Wholesome. _When he came near enough for Skip to notice it, Skip did -- his eyes _sparkled_. “Hi,” he said. His voice was breathy and excited. It was embarrassing and Skip would have made fun of him because of it, except -- “Have we met before?” 

“No,” Skip said. “Have you been to a sex club before?” 

The stranger blushed to the roots of his strawberry-blond hair. “Is that obvious?” 

Skip didn’t say anything, letting his eyes wander up and down the stranger’s body. He was sleek but strong. A speedster? It would explain the hair and awkwardness. But guessing people’s powers, while not directly against the rules of the Loose Goose, went against the spirit of the place. He grinned. “Well, do you wanna go?” 

“Uh, go where?”

A few minutes later, Skip was sucking off ginger-boy’s cock to their mutual satisfaction. In between soft sighs and yeses, he grasped a handful of Skip’s curly black hair and choked out a name and suddenly everything shut down. It wasn’t Skip. It was something that wasn’t _allowed._

Skip spat out the pre-come on to the floor of the bathroom and got up so fast he was almost dizzy. He slammed the boy against the cracked tile of the bathroom wall. 

“You went to the Academy.” It wasn’t a question. Of course. It all made sense now -- Academy kids all moved the same, all trained the same. Skip knew him because Skip knew those moves too. He’d been there, done that, before they had thrown him out. 

Ginger-boy nodded. There wasn’t a trace of fear or hesitation in his eyes. All the shyness from earlier was gone too. He’d known exactly who Skip was from the start. What was sick was that Skip only had figured it out now. 

Fury, an intimately familiar emotion, ran through Skip’s body. He grinned and pressed his body against the boy. “So. You know about me. I’m a _bad_ boy. Once a villain, always a villain, right? Especially if you get tossed out from the Academy of Young Heroes. Zero tolerance and all that.” 

“You seem to relish the role,” said ginger-boy, his gaze lingering on Skip’s lower lip. 

Skip smirked and pulled away, wiping his mouth clean. 

“You’re the Blaze, right? You look pretty different under that mask.” 

The Blaze blushed pink under his freckles. “There’s no aliases here, right?” 

“You broke the the rules first.” 

“Okay, fair.” 

“Is Professor Sanderson still there?” 

“Well, I graduated four years ago, but he retired before my time there.” 

“Too bad he didn’t die. Well, anyway, I just want to tell you -- the Blaze is a terrible alias. You could’ve just gone with Blaze.” 

Then he headbutted the Blaze and ran for the door. 

“Fuck!” the Blaze checked to see if his nose was broken. It wasn’t. “Hey, you can just call me Adam. Really, it’s fine!” 

*

After that, Skip seemed to run into Adam more and more often. When he and Hector were pulling off a heist at the Time-Space Museum, there he was to stop them, even though for sure the museum was part of the Space-Cadet’s hideout, and logically she should be the one stopping crimes being committed there. 

“Are you stalking me?” Skip said, hoisting the time-dilator over his shoulder. He flashed a grin over at Adam, whose face was unfortunately completely covered by that mask. It was really too bad -- now that he knew what was underneath it, anyway. 

“I kind of have to, you’re committing a crime.” 

“This is Space-Cadet’s territory, we all know that.” 

Adam hesitated. His uniform was tight, brightly colored yellow and orange spandex, leaving little to the imagination. His power set was pretty standard a mid-grade superhero -- flying, super-strength, invulnerability, super-speed. Kind of boring, honestly. At least, Skip thought. 

“I’m just doing a friend a favor,” said Adam with a wink. 

“Whatever,” said Skip, using the time dilator to help him and Hector escape. 

After that, it became something of a cat and mouse game between them. Skip’s online posting went down precipitously and his offline crimes went off the charts. Hector started complaining that he couldn’t keep up. When Hector decided to get back with Lindsay, Skip decided it was better to work without a partner for a while. 

At first, it worked really well. Skip was the planner, always had been. Hector had been the doer of their little team, but it wasn’t like Skip had any hang ups or hesitations on that account either. He still worked out of the lair he and Hector had built together -- even though Hector and Lindsay were making vague noises about getting out of the villainy business altogether, moving upstate to have a go at organic farming or whatever. But for now, the lair was still somewhere Skip could work out of. 

He was there when he got the information that Professor Sanderson was going to give a lecture at the Academy of Young Heroes fundraiser. The Blaze was going to be there as well, but Skip wasn’t thinking about him -- at least, not this time. 

The fundraiser was taking place at the Old Core City Opera House, the day after Halloween — All Saints Day. Though Skip usually went out in street clothes over armor — with a domino mask over his face, for tradition’s sake — he decided to do something different for the fundraiser. After all, he wanted to Professor Sanderson to see a familiar face in the crowd when he looked out.

*

It was an arson job and Adam was there. Skip wasn’t supposed to be — he hadn’t set the fire, he wasn’t interested in who was putting it out. He was actually on his phone when Adam approached him and blinked when he quickly took his picture.

“I don’t have much time,” Skip said, which was kind of a lie. He was waiting for a sandwich to be delivered, as well as watching a historical building burn down to the ground. “What do you want?”

“I was wondering if you wanted to go out later and get a bite to eat?”

“Are you asking me out? In public?”

“... Yeah?”

“You realize this violates at least four different codes of conducts you as a hero are sworn to uphold, right? This could completely fuck up your career if I posted this right now.”

“You usually post about sex and murders or secret moon colonies, not rejected dates.”

“I didn’t reject you.”

“You didn’t?”

“Well, it’s true that I could never go out with you,” Skip said slowly. “Because I … don’t want to and I’m busy and you’re not hot enough.” 

“Okay, just one reason is good enough,” said Adam, leaving with a wave of his hand. “I’ll see you.” 

*

The day of the fundraiser dawned clear and bright -- presumably. Skip didn’t roll out of bed until noon. He kept remembering his last days at the Academy and getting pissed off. None of his old classmates had ever stuck up for him, except for Hector, which was probably why they were still friends. 

His old Academy uniform still somehow fit -- he wasn’t going to worry about why. There was probably some technical reason for it. He wondered if Adam still had his. No. That wasn’t going to be useful. Adam wouldn’t understand what was happening -- nothing terrible had ever happened to people like Adam. They lacked the capacity to understand. 

Fuck it. Whatever happened today, it would be over. At least there was that. 

Security was even more elaborate than usual, but that was to be expected. No villain worth their salt wouldn’t have attacked the fundraiser for the Academy for Young Heroes, but most of them focused on the red carpet outside. Skip was already inside, seated in the second row. He endured the boring speeches, tried not to make eye contact with Adam. He was wearing clear glasses and a wig. Not terribly convincing, but he had a flair for drama, not costume design. 

Five minutes into Professor Sanderson’s speech, he stood up and threw off the wig. “Hey, Professor Sanderson! Can you hear me? Yep? I didn’t hack into the sound system for nothing then. Great. Do you remember me? Probably not, so here’s a reminder. I’m Lucas Collins, the student you betrayed --” 

“I remember you, Lucas. Dramatic as ever, I see,” said the professor with a sigh. Adam crossed the stage, heading towards Skip. “I’m afraid we can’t have this discussion right now. Perhaps after the lecture.” 

“I don’t think so,” said Skip. He concentrated hard on what happened next. He rarely stopped time. It was extremely draining and almost always went wrong somehow. In fact, the last time he had tried anything big with it, it was with Professor Sanderson -- that was how the professor had managed to pin those other students’ injuries on him. But he’d had a decade to practice and he wasn’t going to fuck it up again. 

At least he thought so until the Blaze slammed into him and he fucked it up again. It took a second to realize it. Seeing the professor’s smug, satisfied face, telling him he couldn’t do anything, again, and then Adam, interfering, and then, nothing. 

“Fucking hell, we’re in a pocket hell dimension. Shit.” His voice echoed back emptily back at him. He heard Adam groan. They were lucky that their bodies hadn’t merged together. Professor Sanderson’s experiments had obviously gotten better in the intervening years. 

When Adam came to, he didn’t seem to be particularly happy with had happened and somehow, he seemed to blame Skip for everything, even though clearly it wouldn’t have happened if he hadn’t interfered, which Skip was happy to point out to him. 

“I was just there to have a healthy discussion with the professor about how much I hate him and you happened to be there, and now we’re stuck in a hell dimension.” 

“You must’ve known that he would’ve sent you here when you confronted him,” said Adam, frowning.

“Yeah,” Skip said. “I also released all his files, about every fucked up thing he ever did. And he did a lot. His career is over now. By the time I get out, he won’t be able to do a thing to me, ever again.” 

“What did he do to you? I’m listening, if you want to tell me.”

“Oh, you’re suddenly interested now?”

“Well, we’re stuck in a hell dimension together and you can’t blow me off or head-butt me and run away rather than talk to me.” Adam sat down on nothingness and took off his mask. He looked at Skip expectantly. 

“I could still head-butt you and run away,” Skip said, sitting down next to him. “Also, this hell dimension has a lot of critters that love murdering humans so I hope you like fighting.” 

“Oh, I love it,” Adam assured him. “I assume you know how to get out of here?” 

“Yeah. I mean, eventually.” Skip avoided eye-contact for a moment. Adam’s eyes were really blue and really compelling. “Well, the backstory’s kind of boring when you get down to it. I got recruited to the Academy when I was a kid. I didn’t really fit in. Wasn’t a legacy or anything. Had weird powers people couldn’t really sum up well. Time manipulation and dimensions shit. Professor Sanderson recruited me, told me I was special, not like the other kids. Like a dumbass, I believed him. It took me a long time to realize that he was using me to build a portal to throw people into a hell dimension -- like this one, who would’ve thought? When I realized this and tried to stop him, he made some students disappear and blamed that on me. Administration believed him and expelled me. I’ve been blacklisted by the superhero-community ever since.” 

“But you were so young at the time -- 16, 17?” 

“Yeah. But it didn’t matter. Once you’re out, you’re out. At least for people like me.” 

“I hate that,” Adam said. “Once we get out, I want to help clear your name. Lucas, I want to --” 

“Yeah. So, about that. I’ve done a lot of shit since then that aren’t so justified? I mean, when you think about it, villains have a lot more fun than superheroes do.” 

“Mmm,” Adam said. “Okay, so when you said the thing about critters. Do those critters have tentacles by any chance?” 

“Oh yeah, tons of them.” 

“Like a lot of them are wrapped around your waist just now?” 

“Wha-?”

They spent the next few minutes fighting monsters. 

Adam hadn’t been kidding about loving fighting monsters. He seemed to genuinely love it, even tearing into them with his bare hands. Skip had his utility belt, but that was absolutely geared more for urban breaking in and skullduggery than monster-fighting, but he was able to sharpen a few miscellaneous pieces of metal and plastic that had traveled with them through the portal into adequate weapons. 

Once they’d managed to clear the area of monsters, both Skip and Adam were soaked to the skin with monster blood and feeling weirdly amped. 

“Uh. We should be looking for a way out of here,” Skip muttered, trying not to obviously rub one out in his old Academy dress pants. He didn’t know what he had been thinking, wearing this shit. His therapist, Ronnie, was going to be so pissed at him. This was such a disaster. 

Adam was looking at him, his eyes huge. He licked his lips. That spandex uniform was really not leaving anything to the imagination. “Yeah. Yeah. Do you think, um --” 

“What?” Skip was having a really hard time not staring at Adam like a creep. He tore his eyes up to Adam’s face. _Don’t be a creep, don’t be a creep. _

“... Is the monster blood maybe an aphrodisiac?” 

“Shit, man. You’re totally right,” Skip said and pounced. It was really wonderful to peel Adam out of that awful spandex suit of his, and maybe put some bites on that creamy white skin. Skip knew that he himself to be kind of squirrelly, weird and neurotic, but Adam seemed earnestly to want to see him naked and want to make him come. Which was good. Which was really, really good. 

“So you were lying before,” Adam said as he pumped Skip’s cock _oh-so-slowly_ with nothing but spit and a good attitude for lubrication. Skip blinked at him, not understanding why the fuck he was talking when they could be making out. 

“What?” 

“When you said I wasn’t hot enough.” 

“Of course I was lying! I was blowing you five minutes after we first met. Are you an idiot? How could you believe me?” 

Adam’s jaw clenched. “When people say things, you don’t automatically assume they mean the exact opposite of what they’re saying. Usually!”

“Yeah, well, people usually aren’t me. Get used to it!” And then, to calm him, he sighed and said, as sincerely as he could, “So this is the truth: please let me come.” 

Adam kissed him. “Okay.” 

*

It took them six months to escape the hell dimension and get back to Core City. But due to the vagaries of time and space, only three weeks had elapsed in the real world. After hurried goodbyes, both Skip and Adam went off to see what the hell had happened to the rest of their lives, and for Adam, to make sure someone had been taking care of Mr. Norbert, his cat. 

(Mr. Norbert was fine, Adam’s neighbor had been taking care of him.) 

Life went on. Hector and Lindsay did decide to quit the super villainy business and move upstate to become organic farmers. Skip had to shutter the lair, and that got him thinking. His way of life hadn’t been serving him for a long time. Maybe being stuck in a hell dimension for six months with an adorably optimistic (but surprisingly bloodthirsty) superhero had changed something in him, but Skip thought the change went even deeper. He wanted to move on. He felt different now too, and he wanted to stay different, not keep drifting by like he’d always done. 

He made another appointment with his therapist, Ronnie. And this time, he actually showed up when he was supposed to and listened to Ronnie yell at him. It was therapeutic. 

*

It was nineties night at the Loose Goose -- it was always nineties night at the Loose Goose -- and people had to come in from the secondary entrance since someone had melted the front door with a freeze-ray. He’d slipped in, intending to grab a drink and then get out of here when he felt a tap on his shoulder. 

He turned to see Adam there and gestured to the stool next to him. “How’s it going?” 

“Pretty good. How about you?” 

“I’m okay, but I heard that Professor Sanderson is going to appeal his expulsion from the Council of Superheroes. How are we going to solve this?” 

“Right now, he can go to hell. But my therapist tells me that I gotta focus on the future. How’s Mr. Norbert?” 

“Well, he’s thriving. Likes my neighbor much more than he likes me. Um. I heard that you retired as Skip, but then there was nothing else on the radar. What’s going on with you?” 

“Well, I didn’t know if they would let me in as Lucas Collins, but luckily, someone melted the front door with freeze ray, so it wasn’t a problem.” 

Adam gave him a suspicious look, but Lucas looked back at him innocently. 

“I’m not a supervillain anymore. I’m an anti-hero who does consulting. Look, here’s my card.” Lucas handed Adam one of his freshly printed cards and Adam examined it closely. 

“Very nice. Is that bone?” 

Lucas smirked at him. “How about you? I heard you got into some hot water after coming back. Getting a little rough around the edges. Not satisfied with being so squeaky clean anymore?” 

“I’m still the same. Essentially, anyway. Hey, do you want to --” Adam looked uncertain and maybe a little scared, as if Lucas was going to reject him again. Which was fair. Lucas nodded and grabbed him, pulling him through the noisy crowd of the Loose Goose until they were outside, in an empty alleyway. It was raining softly and they were kissing. It felt wonderful, earned, perfect. 

Of course, then Adam had to ruin it. “I guess I should mention I do have a few exes...” 

“Are they evil? Are there seven of them?” 

“No! They’re morally neutral and you can fight them only if you want to.” 

“Aw, fuck it,” Lucas said. He was grinning and Adam grinned back. It was going to be a good night. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to my beta! Title from Queens of the Stone Age, [Make It Wit Chu](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcJdyy9-FYU).


End file.
